Interlude
by Heath07
Summary: RyanAnna-ish Takes place somewhere between "Queen of Reasonable" and "Balance." Ryan's perspective.


Title: Interlude

Author: Heath07

Rating: PG

E-mail: Lame_Trickster@hotmail.com

Summary: Takes place between "Queen of Reasonable" and "Balance". Ryan's perspective. 

Disclaimer: I don't own...

Feedback: Yes, please. Thank you to those that have replied and those that continue to reply.

Notes: I haven't decided whether I will be writing anymore to this series, but I really do like this pairing. I wanted to show how Ryan was kind of feeling, even though I still kept him sort of secretive, I did give a little glimpse into his head and motivations. Hopefully it makes more sense now and makes Ryan seem a little more honourable than a cheating boyfriend (even though he is in this story). lol 

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Ryan didn't believe in fate and he didn't care much for love. Love was not a word that came without punishment in his world.  
  


Marissa was supposed to be the love of his life, that's what people wanted to think. Hell, for a while, he thought it, too. Until he was reminded how closely she resembled his mother and all the problems he thought he'd left back in Chino.  
  


Chino. Thinking about Chino always made him ache just a little because thinking of Chino ultimately led to thinking about his past and in his past was his alcoholic mother, his locked-up brother and father and Theresa.

Contrary to popular belief, not everything in his life was shit before moving to Newport. He had a few good memories and a few good friends and he had Theresa.  
  


Theresa was the first girl he ever fucked - even the girls in Chino didn't say sappy things like "make love," they were far too jaded for that load of bullshit. He was thirteen and not entirely prepared when she slipped through his window and cried over his busted lip and bruised ribs. She told him she'd make it better; and though she couldn't take the marks away, she had made it better in her own way, the best way she knew how. She crawled on top of him and kissed his lips and took him inside and made it better. And he was grateful and sad and confused all at the same time. He wished he had someone to talk to about it all. Someone like his father.  
  


When he and Marissa "made love" he had a tendency to zone out, to not really be there. It was like all those times one of his mother's countless boyfriends had too much to drink and decided they didn't like the look of him so they roughed him up a little...or a lot, until he was bloody and didn't look so smug anymore. It wasn't her fault. Not really. She just couldn't make him burn the same way Theresa had...the same way Anna did.  
  


Jesus, Anna. Just looking at her got him hard and he was pretty sure she knew just what she did to him. Hanging out with Anna was a visceral experience. He never grasped the full meaning until Saturday was over and he waited all week for it to come around again.   
  


The thing that got to him, what made him itch, was the way she looked at him. He knew she wanted him. And maybe that made him want her, too. The awareness that there was someone who wanted him in a purely physical way drove him to kiss her that first Saturday. She didn't need him to pick up the pieces to her life. To hold her hair back while she vomited alcohol she promised not to consume. To listen while she talked about all the pressure she was under. And how much he meant to her   
  


Anna didn't _need_ him at all.   
  


Anna _wanted_ him.   
  


Like Theresa had wanted him.  
  


And though Marissa was supposed to be the one he loved, it was with Anna that he was at his most vulnerable. Maybe because she reminded him of all the things he'd left behind or maybe 

because he could see in her eyes how thirsty she was for understanding, to be accepted.   
  


"Ryan?"   
  


He looked up, his eyes connecting with Anna's. He wondered how long he hadn't been listening. "Hmm?"  
  


"Soda?" Anna said, passing him the cola. Thirsty. Oh, the irony.  
  


"Yeah, uh, thanks," he answered, his fingers wrapping around the can and grazing hers.

And her skin was soft like the silk tie he wore to his father's sentencing. He had let it slip through his chubby kid fingers when he couldn't sit still and his mother told him to stop fidgeting and Trey punched him in the arm so hard he had to bite his lip so it wouldn't tremble and there was nothing left to do but pull at the knot and listen as a judge talked about his father like he wasn't in the room. He remembered his father's eyes as he bent down and said goodbye and gave his hair a gentle tousle and told him to be a 'good boy'. He remembered the ache in his chest and could dredge it up whenever he stepped into Anna's garage. Maybe that was why he kept coming Saturday after Saturday. Maybe it had nothing to do with Anna and the burn she made him feel whenever she got closer than ten feet...  
  


People used to tell him he looked just like his dad.   
  


He didn't talk about himself. Not really. In fact, he didn't talk much at all. People told him he got that from his father too, because his mother sure knew how to gab. He'd told Anna about working on cars with his dad without even thinking. It had just slipped out and he wondered how she made everything between them seem so natural.  
  


People used to say his father could have been someone if he wasn't so goddamn unlucky and hadn't been born poor. They said he was smart and kind and when he did deem it appropriate to talk, everyone listened.   
  


People used to say a lot of things.  
  


All Ryan really remembered were afternoons in the driveway under the hoods of cars with the sun on his back and his father's rough hand over his, showing him how to check the oil, or waxing the hood so it shined like the ocean, or the coolness of his touch as he handed him a soda, leaned back against the car and slinging his arm over his shoulder as they admired their work. He remembered his father's smell: a combination of aftershave and cigarettes, blended with the faint odour of sweat and steel from his job at the factory - he never could rinse that smell away. His father's voice. Low. Quiet. Calm. Even when Ryan was in trouble. And he remembered his father's eyes; eyes he saw every time he looked in the mirror.  
  


Maybe he was working out deeper issues each Saturday; getting to the core of his own problems and in turn healing the broken bits inside. But one look at Anna and that theory was squashed. Because although he thought a lot about his past and some about the future, mostly he thought about getting into Anna's pants...or skirts...or shorts... Mostly, he thought about that "kiss" (and he knew it had been more than that) and how it couldn't happen again.   
  


The thing about that kiss... well, the thing was...he liked it. More than liked it. And if he let it happen again, it would only end badly. If there was one thing his father taught him, it was that real men don't walk away from their obligations, and Marissa was definitely an obligation.

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end.


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